Week in Review

We transport heavy freight over land by train. And transport people over land by plane. Have you ever wondered why we do this? Especially you train enthusiasts who would love to travel by train more often? Here’s why. Cost. Railroads are incredibly expensive to build, maintain and operate. Because there is rail infrastructure from point A to point B. And at their terminus points. Whereas planes fly through the air between point A and point B. Without the need for infrastructure. Except at their terminus points. Making railroading far more expensive than flying.

If planes are so much cheaper to operate than trains then why don’t we use planes to transport all our freight? Here’s why. Price. Trains charge by the ton of freight they transport. And they can carry a lot of tons. An enormous amount of tons. Which makes the per-ton price relatively inexpensive. A plane can carry nowhere near the amount of freight a train can carry. It’s not even close. Which makes the per-ton price to ship by plane very, very expensive. So only high priority freight that has to be somewhere fast will travel by plane. Heavy bulk items all travel by train.

We may be having an obesity problem but in the grand scheme of things people are very light. But take up a lot of volume for their given weight. The space their body physically occupies. And the greater space around them containing the air they must breathe. That holds the food and drink they must consume. And the toilets they need to relieve themselves. Now let’s look at a 747-400 with 450 passengers on board. Let’s say the average weight of everyone comes to 195 pounds. So the total flying weight of the people comes to 87,750 pounds. Assuming flying costs for one trip at $125,000 that comes to $1.42 per pound. If we add 15% for overhead and profit we get a $1.64 per-pound ticket price. So a 275-pound man must pay $451 to fly. While a 120-pound woman must pay $197 to fly. Of course we don’t charge people by the pound to fly. At least, not yet. No, we charge per person. So the per-person price is $224, where the lighter people subsidize the price of the heavier people.

The 747-400 is one of the most successful airplanes in the world because it can pack so many people on board. Reducing the per-person cost. Now let’s look at that same cost being distributed over only 28 passengers. When we do the per-person cost comes to $4,464. Adding 15% for overhead and markup brings the per-person price to $5,134. A price so high that few people could afford to pay for it. Or would choose to pay for it. And this is why we transport people by plane. That can carry a lot of people. And we transport heavy freight by train. That can carry a lot of tons. And why this idea will probably not work (see Elon Musk Is Dead Wrong About The Cost Of The Hyperloop: In Reality It Would Be $100 Billion by Jim Edwards posted 8/16/2013 on Business Insider).

Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s plan for a space-age Hyperloop transport system between Los Angeles and San Francisco would cost only $7.5 billion, he said in the plans he published recently…

But the New York Times did us all a favor by calculating the true cost of the Hyperloop: It’s going to be ~$100 billion…

The Hyperloop is a pressurized tube system in which passenger cars zoom around on an air cushion, at up to 800 miles an hour.

There is no greater infrastructure cost between point A and point B than there is for high-speed rail. Because these rails have to be dedicated rails. With no grade crossings. All other traffic either tunnels underneath or bridges overhead. These tracks are electrified. Adding more infrastructure than just the tracks. All of which has to be maintained to exacting standards to allow high-speed trains to travel safely. Which is why high-speed rail is the most costly form of transportation. Why there are no private high-speed rail lines as only taxpayer subsidies can pay for these. And for all these costs these trains just don’t transport a lot of people. Making high-speed rail the most inefficient way to transport people.

The Hyperloop will be more costly than high-speed rail as this is an elevated tube system of exacting standards. Requiring great costs to build, maintain and operate. While transporting so few people per trip (28 per capsule). Not to mention high-speed travel is very dangerous. Unless it is up in the air separated by miles of open air. But on the ground? When a high-speed train crashes it is pretty catastrophic. And it can tear up the infrastructure it travels on. Shutting the line down. So traveling 800 miles an hour inside a narrow tube is probably not the safest thing to do.

Of course the biggest fear in a system like this is some politician will pass legislation to build it. Because of all the taxpayer-subsidized union jobs it will create. As they are constantly trying to build high-speed rail for the same reasons. For the politics. Not because it’s a good idea. For any idea requiring taxpayer subsidies is rarely a good idea.